Cannes Premiere 2025: Auteurs Return with Intimate, Expansive Visions

Cannes Premiere continues to be a space for celebrated filmmakers presenting new work outside of the main competition — often their most personal or formally exploratory films.

Fatih Akin returns with Amrum, an atmospheric family drama set on the North Sea coast. Lise Akoka & Romane Gueret, known for The Worst Ones, offer Ma Frère, a poignant sibling story. Michael Angelo Covino’s Splitsvillechannels dark comedy through fractured relationships.

From the Philippines, Lav Diaz presents Magalhães, a historical epic from a master of slow cinema, while Koji Fukada’s Renai Saiban (Love on Trial) interrogates romantic disillusionment.

Other standouts include La Ola (The Wave) by Sebastián Lelio, Raoul Peck’s Orwellian inquiry 2+2=5, and *Kirill Serebrennikov’s haunting The Disappearance of Josef Mengele.

This section honors filmmakers whose distinctive voices evolve film form with every project.